Photographer Leonard Nimoy, whose exhibition “Secret Selves” was on display in 2010-11 at MASS MoCA in North Adams has died. He was 83. His most indelible role was as Mr. Spock, the totally logical human-alien first officer of the Starship Enterprise in the television and movie juggernaut “Star Trek.” He also recreated the life of Vincent van Gogh writing the play “Vincent,” seen in these parts with Jim Briggs in the dual roles of the Theo and Vincent van Gogh (review).

Nimoy – who announced that he had the disease COPD last year – attributed it to years of smoking. Even though it was a habit he had given up three decades earlier, his wife, Susan Bay Nimoy, confirmed that the cause of death was end-stage chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. He had been hospitalized earlier in the week. He died on Friday morning (February 27) at his home in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles.

Apparently, it’s Leonard Nimoy week in Massachusetts. Boston-born Nimoy, best known as the actor/director of Star Trek fame, has been a practicing photographer for most of his life and in April of this year he announced his retirement from acting to concentrate on photography. This week, two solo exhibitions kick off to showcase his work.

Opening at MASS MoCA in North Adams on Sunday is “Secret Selves”, a series of recent photographs examining the lost, unseen or hidden self:

Inspired by Aristophanes’ theory that humans were once double-sided creatures with two heads and multiple limbs before Zeus cleaved man in two and left him forever struggling to be whole again, Nimoy’s photographs reveal his subjects’ other half. Shooting in nearby Northampton, Massachusetts, Nimoy recruited volunteers from the local community with an open call for portrait models willing to be photographed posed and dressed as their true or imagined “secret selves.” From the popular rock star and superman to the more unexpected dog lover and Pan, these various secret identities (off-line avatars as they might be described) offer an intimate, sometimes humorous, and often profound new look at the residents of Northampton and the inner yearnings and fantasies that we all share.

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